


King of the Clouds

by enbyred



Series: Pray for the Wicked [7]
Category: Miraculous Ladybug
Genre: Friendship, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Light Angst, Trans Adrien Agreste | Chat Noir, Trans Character
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-19
Updated: 2019-03-19
Packaged: 2019-11-25 20:37:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,780
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18171182
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/enbyred/pseuds/enbyred
Summary: Chat Noir just wants a few hours of freedom to run around Paris. He didn’t plan to spend time with Nino, and definitely didn’t expect Nino to know one of his biggest secrets.





	King of the Clouds

**Author's Note:**

> Based off Panic! At the Disco’s King of the Clouds

Chat Noir climbed out Adrien's window and vaulted through the city. Paris was quiet. The world was asleep. Most lights were off, except for just a few. Chat Noir wasn't supposed to be awake. He wasn't supposed to be out. He was supposed to be asleep, having finished his homework, but he would claim to Nathalie in the morning that he was sick, and simply not go to school. Then he would wander Paris some more. Anything to get out. Anything to be free of the weight of Adrien, free of the weight of his father's expectations. Running and vaulting was therapeutic. He finally got some time to himself. He finally got some quiet, some time to clear his head.

The night air was cold against his cheeks, and the light breeze made him shiver. Yet it felt worlds better than the stuffy air in his prison of a bedroom. Those restraints didn't apply out here. Here, he could do what he wanted, be who he wanted. Here, he could be Chat Noir, not only a hero of Paris, but his truest self.

Stopping at the top of the Eiffel Tower, Chat Noir closed his eyes and grinned, letting the cold air sweep over him and fill him with delight. He was above all of Paris from up there. He could see everything when he wanted to. Just by looking down at the lights, he could have seamlessly gotten himself anywhere, to the Grand Paris, the Couffaines', school, the bakery…. This was his city. He was its king, with Ladybug ruling as queen.

Leaping down from the Tower, beam by beam, he relished the feeling of his stomach jumping into his throat. There was no akuma to worry about, no villain, no crime-fighting to do. He wasn't even sure what time it was, but Hawkmoth was definitely asleep.

At the bottom of the Tower, he stopped and took a breath, hand on his chest. Plagg was kind enough to incorporate chest compression into his suit that was safe to exercise in, but he still found himself breathless. Taking a moment to stretch, he started jogging again, growing gradually faster and getting back up to speed to vault back through the city.

Running over rooftops, he leaped and vaulted and jumped and somersaulted and gained speed more and more. He tore through the city as fast as his body could handle, until his foot caught on the edge of a rooftop, sending him tumbling down into a fall he couldn't regain footing from. Skidding across the roof, he tried his best to stop himself, his cheek getting torn open and leaving a few spots of blood on the roof.

"Dammit," he muttered, pounding his fist on the roof as soon as he stopped skidding. "Dammit!" This was  _ his _  city, he knew it by heart, he knew where he was, he knew all the places that could trip him up. He could easily say that he knew the city better than Ladybug did. She wasn't one for running around the city while transformed without reason. She didn't explore like he did.

He laid down on the roof, groaning and grabbing fistfuls of his hair. This was the one throne he had. He couldn't be knocked down.

"Dude, you okay?"

Chat Noir jumped, looking over to see Nino Lahiffe's head popping up to look at him.

"Wh-" Chat Noir got to his hands and knees, crawling over to the edge to Nino and peek over the side to see that Nino was standing on an access ladder next to a window.

A gentle finger turning Chat's face to examine the cut on his face, Nino's eyebrows knit in concern. "Sounded like a bad fall. You need any help? We've got a first aid kit."

Ready to refuse, Chat Noir opened his mouth, but wasn't able to get a word out. What were his other options? Keep running? Fall asleep in an alley? On Marinette's balcony? Go back home? He wasn't doing that.

"Okay."

Nino led him inside through the window and sat him down on his bed as he fetched the first aid kit. Adrien had been in Nino's room before, but it felt completely different to be there clad in leather with cat ears. It was as though he was sitting in a completely different room. He had never noticed the Chat Noir poster and action figure sitting on his desk. A blush crept its way onto his cheeks.

"Alright, dude, here we go." Nino returned with a small first aid kit and rifled through it for something to clean the wound.

"It's really not that bad an injury," Chat muttered feebly, wiping the blood away. "You don't need to worry. I…shouldn't be bugging you. It's late."

Rolling his eyes with a smile, Nino said, "You're not bugging anyone. I invited you in. Now hold still." He gently patted Chat Noir's cheek with a cloth. The disinfectant stung, but no more than the fall had. There was no way he was going to wince at disinfectant in front of a civilian and make Nino think he couldn't handle it.

They were quiet as Nino finished cleaning Chat Noir's face and secured a bandage to his cheek, minor as the injury was. Chat certainly hadn't expected Nino to be so ready to patch up a moody hero out on an angst run, but he supposed that Nino usually was full of surprises.

"Thanks," Chat muttered, bringing his legs up to curl into a ball, being conscious to not get his shoes on the covers. "Shouldn't you be asleep? You don't need to be taking in strays at this hour."

With a snort, Nino replied, "You clearly don't know my family. If my mother knew that you got hurt on our roof at two in the morning and I  _ hadn't _  invited you in, she would have pitched a fit. And it's not like I sleep on weekends anyway." That was true. Nino was known to be the one who refused to sleep when they didn't have school the next day. More than once when they met up with Alya and Marinette to hang out on the weekend, Nino had been tragically late because he hadn't gone to bed that night and drifted off to sleep around five in the morning.

"Well, I appreciate it." Chat Noir stood and stepped toward the window. "I should be going. Don't want to inconvenience you more than I already have."

"What were you doing out so late?" Nino asked before he could get to the window.

Chat paused and looked down at his shoes. Should he say the real reason, that he didn't want to be anywhere near his home? Or just blame it on nonexistent insomnia? Say that there was a scuffle near where he lived and he had gone to resolve it, and decided to do a short patrol for good measure? That one sounded good. At least vaguely plausible and heroic. It wasn't like he could tell the truth to a civilian. He didn’t want to risk endangering Nino.

"I couldn't stay at home," he found himself saying.  _ What?? Where did that come from?? I decided to make something up about a mugging!! _  "I hate being there, and being Chat Noir is so much better. It's freeing." Well, there was no going back now. His heart was racing (since it had clearly realized that saying what he did was a bad idea) and his breathing had picked up. On instinct, his hand raised to his chest to make sure he could breathe properly with the compression.

"Dude." Nino softly took Chat Noir's hand and led him to sit back down on the bed with him. "There's…a lot to unpack there. I get it, you're a hero, you can't tell me too much about your life because of your secret identity and stuff. But tell me this, are you safe at home?"

Chat looked up at Nino in surprise. "I, uh…I mean, I guess so. I don't like being there, but I don't think I'm unsafe. What made you think that?"

Shaking his head, Nino said, "Okay, I'll just cut to it. Is it hard for you to be there because you're trans? Does your family give you a rough time?"

"What?" He blinked, trying to discern how Nino had figured it out. He had never said anything to reporters about being transgender, he couldn't even remember telling Ladybug. Why would he need to? The miraculous magic made it almost impossible to tell. "How did you know?"

Nino gestured to Chat Noir's hand and said, "You checked your breathing. My best bro Adrien does that a lot. How many hours you been binding tonight?"

Chat Noir shrugged. "Just one or two. Don't worry, the suit's easier to breathe in than a binder. Safe to exercise in, I can wear it longer. I guess I checked my breathing out of habit." His face was warm. He wasn't used to anyone but Nathalie asking questions and making sure that he wasn't overdoing it.

"That's good to hear," he replied with a smile. "I know you said you're safe at home, but if you want to stay here for the night, you're welcome to. You can come by anytime you want. My parents would love to have you."

A smirk tugging at his lips, Chat Noir asked, "They won't be mad about taking in the famed stray of Paris? Your family would get a lot of attention from the press if you adopted this particular cat."

"Chat Noir, my parents would be  _ ecstatic _  to have a cat son. Now get into bed, you're sleeping here tonight." Before Chat could try to figure out how to sleep with his feet hanging off the bed, Nino insisted, "And don't worry about your shoes, it's fine."

Well if  _ that _  was the case…. Chat curled under the covers and pulled them up to his chin, grinning at Nino.

"This is really okay?"

"Dude, go to sleep," Nino laughed. "Hope you don't mind if we share the bed, since I'm gonna need  _ some _  sleep."

Chat held up the blanket to invite his friend next to him. Nino flipped the light off and crawled in next to Chat Noir.

"Thanks again."

"No problem, stray."

-

Nino rose probably around noon, and the first thing he noticed when he woke up was the smell of pastries. He reached for his glasses and his hand hit a paper bag that, upon closer inspection, was the holder of said pastries. There was a note taped to it.

_ Thanks for everything, and congrats on adopting a cat _ .


End file.
